


Daddy Daycare

by EdgarAllenPoet



Series: Dads of Marmora [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Because when do they not, Canon Compliant, Gen, Kolivan is tired, Lance and Keith go at it again, Post-Episode: s02e08 The Blade of Marmora, dads of marmora, let him rest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-09
Packaged: 2018-11-12 03:45:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11153556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EdgarAllenPoet/pseuds/EdgarAllenPoet
Summary: "Kolivan turned to investigate the yelp and saw Lance rubbing at his side and pouting.  Antok shrugged innocently, and well, he’d never done great with children.  Antok tended to practice pinching as a discipline tactic."





	Daddy Daycare

**Author's Note:**

> Ya'll seemed to like the "Antok, they're toddlers," line so I decided to run with that. 
> 
> Takes place in the same plot as the Five Times fic, somewhere before the last bit when Shiro goes missing, so the end of season 2 hasn't happened yet and they're still lost in space some place.

Kolivan knew, with all good sense, that the paladins weren’t actually children.  At least, most of them weren’t.  He had questions about the youngest one.  She was so small, but not much besides size seemed to separate her from her colleagues.  Maturity levels fluctuated among all of them in a way that was hard to gauge.  

 

All he knew was that human lifespans were different.  A short discussion had helped him grasp what was meant exactly by the word “years,” and he thought he had a pretty good understanding of those measurements by now.  While a twenty-or-so year old Galra would still be under other’s care and years away from seeing battle or serious training, a twenty-or-so year old human was pretty much full grown. 

 

That was another thing that troubled Kolivan.  Full grown, and yet even the largest of them was so small.  They couldn’t even shape shift like the Alteans.  They had few physical resources for fighting.  Full grown or not, outside the battle field where they were warriors and nothing less, Kolivan struggled to see them as anything but children. 

 

Which, he supposed, is how this all happened in the first place. 

 

There wasn’t much to do while the Alteans figured out how to get back to known territory.  Whatever had gone wrong with the wormhole, whatever had gotten them lost in the first place, had done a number on the castle.  They weren’t sure exactly what was wrong, and Kolivan didn’t know how to help.

 

The base for the Blade of Marmora had been constructed by the generation before them, the previous leader and a team of ingenious engineers.  Kolivan knew of the base’s properties, but not in any applicable terms.  He was little use with fixing the ship, and while he did his best to help with navigation, that process was just as slow and grueling.  

 

Kolivan wasn’t a scientist, he was a leader.  At times like this it felt like he was also a babysitter. 

 

Antok had gotten there first.  They’d been strolling a corridor, discussing a plan the youngest of the paladins had laid out for possible communication between the ship and the Marmora headquarters.  There were risks involved, with the signal being vulnerable to disruption and all, but leaving the Marmora without leadership for so long would only lead to trouble in the future.  They had safeguards set up, of course they did, but Kolivan was worried, as was Antok.

 

He had faith that his men could continue without his guidance, but that didn’t mean he wanted to sit by and watch it happen. 

 

They’d been strolling the corridor, deep in conversation, when the sound of clashing voices caught their attention.  Antok moved first, darting toward the building chaos.  Kolivan gave himself a moment to ponder calling one of the others, knowing Antok could handle an emergency for a few seconds without help, before changing his mind and charging after. 

 

It could be a fight.  Someone could have snuck into the castle while they were unaware and attacked one of the people on board.  Something could be exploding, or breaking down.  There could be serious trouble.

 

The trouble he encountered upon stepping into the room was one of a less serious variety.  In the middle of the room stood Antok, face unreadable through his mask but body language tense, holding two struggling, snarling paladins off the floor by the backs of their jackets. 

 

“What is the situation?” he asked, assessing the scene quickly and standing taller. 

 

Antok snarled and shook Keith roughly when the boy kicked out and connected with Antok’s hip.  He continued to struggle uselessly, but that wasn’t a surprise.  The kid was a little spitfire.  Kolivan had seen that from their first meeting during the trials at the headquarters.  He fought with the vigor of a Galra soldier, and he still hadn’t learned when to quit. 

 

The other at least had the common sense to give in.  He hung limply, toes just scuffing the floor beneath him, hands above his head and clutching at the Antok’s arm to steady himself.

 

It was common practice to hold unruly Galra cubs by the scruffs of their necks, but human anatomy was different.  So long as they didn’t look harmed, Kolivan wasn’t going to step in. 

“There was a fight,” Antok explained, which wasn’t a surprise either.  The paladins were always wrestling and sparring and arguing.  These two argued more than most, but they remained friendly with each other.

 

Antok wasn’t Kolivan’s right hand for nothing.  He followed his train of thought easily and shook his head.  “They came to blows,” he explained.  “It was not companionable.” 

 

Then it was time for the cubs in question to speak up.  “I didn’t mean to hit you like that,” Keith said, still kicking about.  

 

Lance whipped his head around and snarled.  “Sure, mullet.  Just like you didn’t mean to kick me in the-” 

 

“You jumped me first!” 

 

“You started it!” 

 

“Not my fault you can’t take a joke!” 

 

Kolivan could feel himself developing a headache.  “Enough!” he barked, voice loud and echoing.  Both boys flinched back and dropped silent, Keith even stopping his struggle against Antok’s grip on him.  “You are behaving like children.  You are beyond this.”

 

“Tell that to  _ Keith _ ,” Lance complained.  “He started this!” 

 

“Oh bite me.” 

 

“That’s kinky.” 

“Shut the hell up, I swear-” 

 

The paladins may not have been children, but they certainly behaved like them from time to time.  And well, they didn’t have cubs at the Blade of Marmora.  The resistance headquarters was no place for children.  The closest they had was young soldiers, fresh cadets, who come to think of it behaved a lot like the paladins did during any sort of downtime.  That didn’t mean Kolivan had never dealt with children.  He could handle this. 

 

“Give him to me,” he said, taking Keith from Antok’s grip and carrying the short distance across the room.  It would never cease to amaze him how weightless humans were.  He might as well have been carrying a pillow. 

 

He dropped said pillow onto the floor when they reached the corner of the room, pushing him down until he was sitting on the floor facing both walls.  Keith finally ceased struggling, instead sitting there silently and staring the wall down with a puzzled expression. 

 

“Wait,” he said, finally.  “You’re putting us in time out?” 

 

“You may move when you can be cordial with each other.  Until then, you remain.” 

 

Kolivan heard movement behind him.  Lance snapped, “This is bullshit!  You can’t- ow! Hey!”  

 

Kolivan turned to investigate the yelp and saw Lance rubbing at his side and pouting.  Antok shrugged innocently, and well, he’d never done great with children.  Antok tended to practice pinching as a discipline tactic. 

 

“When apologies are made, you will be set free,” Kolivan reiterated, settling back against the wall and a tired shrug.  “We will wait.” 

 

“Good luck getting an apology out of mullet over there- ow! Knock it off!” 

 

“You do not sass the leader of the Blade of Marmora,” Antok deadpanned.  Kolivan fought back a grin.

 

“Okay, fine,” Lance grumbled.  Keith huffed and crossed his arms.  Kolivan rested his weight against the wall and settled in to wait. 

 

 

 

…

 

 

That was where Shiro found them two hours later, both boys still scowling stubbornly at their individual corners while Antok stood, unbudging, and Kolivan rested his eyes. 

 

“Um…” he said, poking his head into the room and glancing around.  “What’s going on here?” 

 

“Discipline,” Kolivan replied easily, ignoring the scoff he got from the half-Galra near him.  

 

“The cubs were misbehaving,” Antok added.  

 

Shiro blinked a few times, mouth pulling into a hardpressed line while he nodded slowly.  “Alright… well… Hunk said dinner will be ready in half an hour, if you decide to let them go by then….”  There was something akin to poorly masked amusement on Shiro’s face, but Kolivan may have been wrong about that.  He was still learning to understand human mannerisms, and he wasn’t sure what about this situation Shiro might find amusing.

 

“They may leave when they agree to behave,” Kolivan explained.  A smile spread itself over Shiro’s face as he shook his head again, hand coming up to cover his eyes. 

 

“Of course,” he choked out.  “Good luck, then.” 

 

He turned and left, leaving Kolivan to ponder their conversation.  He may have underestimated the sheer stubbornness of the young paladins before him, but it made no difference. If Kolivan could wait Zarkon out for thousands of years, could keep his head while training armies and plotting strategies.  If he could fight in a war with an unlikely chance of winning, then he could wait out a couple of children. 

 

And they were children, despite what they had to say about it.  Kolivan would not have his mind changed about that fact.  When they’d lived a couple hundred years, had the maturity that came from those experiences, then they’d talk.  For now, he’d wait patiently, for them to grow up and for the castle to be found again.  

 

Sometimes Kolivan couldn’t believe they were putting the universe’s most powerful weapon into the hands of people so young, but despite spells like this, he had neverending faith in them. 

 

They fought like devils, even against each other sometimes.  It would be alright.

**Author's Note:**

> I like to think they stayed there for several hours, until Lance got so sick of being pinched for fidgeting that he finally gave in and grumbled an apology. Keith seems like the kind of guy who could stare at a wall for four hours without going crazy, y'know?


End file.
